Observation / Reflection #4:Be Quiet! I'm Trying To Talk!
In this observation, pay attention to how your teacher manages his or her classroom. What types of disruptions, if any, occur while you're visiting? How do they set the class in motion? How do they deal with interruptions (from the outside) and disruptions (from their students)? Determine whether there are students in the classes that you will teach that are especially troublesome. Ask your CT how he or she addresses these students' needs. Reflect on your "vision" of an ideal science classroom. What classroom policies will you try to implement in YOUR classroom? How does your vision align with your teaching philosophy?
Observations:
During this observation, I was focusing in on the interruptions and disruptions my CT encountered throughout a normal class period and how she dealt with them. The first disruption I noticed in the classroom was a student saying sarcastically "this is SO easy" referring to an inquiry activity the class was participating in. The teacher quickly replied " if it's so easy, why don't you go up to the front of the class and teach it?". The class watched as this boy who called out now grew embarrassed. The next disruption occurred when Ms. Malone was instructing the students to bring in an egg the following day for extra credit. As she began her sentence "tomorrow I need you to bring in...", one of the male students in the front row shouted "a dead body!". Ms. Malone understood the student was obviously joking but she delivered a disproving look followed by saying "No...I need you to bring in an egg, I'm not sure why you want to bring in a dead body or how you would get one, but I don't want to know". Another disruption Ms. Malone encountered was a student walking in late past the bell. Ms. Malone had this student turn right back around and get a note from the office explaining why he was late. The student did as he was told and the class was only paused for a moment. The only interruptions Ms. Malone faced this day were various loud speaker announcements in the middle of class. There was a blood drive at school this day and so somebody would come on the loudspeaker every twenty minutes or so to call a new group down. Although it was quite irritating Ms. Malone would only pause for the students to hear the announcement, and then go right on teaching her lesson. While listening, the teacher held eye contact with the class so the students k ew to stay focused until it was over. These were the interruptions and disruptions that Ms. Malone experienced this day of observing in her classroom.
Reflections:
I feel that the teacher in this case maintained control of the classroom by staying on top of the class behaviors, and reprimanding where necessary. I noticed that the disruptions that occurred within the classroom, Ms. Malone addreses and corrected, whereas interruptions from outside the classroom were ignored if possible. I liked this technique because the teacher addressed the issues she had control over but ignored the ones she had no control over. By doing this she successfully created a serious working environment inside the classroom where the students were on task and following directions. She kept the students on task with constant reminders, modeling good behavior, and teaching the students to not become distracted by outside noise and interruptions.
Ms. Malone was faced with a situation or two where proper management of the class was in jeopardy. In each situation she used a management technique that brought the class back under her control. For example, when a student called out to finish her sentence innappropriately, she gave him a look that communicated that she thought he was being silly and immature. She did not yell and her look did not make the boy feel stupid or embarrassed, it was just disproving and reiterating that she was trying to teach the class and he interrupted her with a silly comment. In her response she also addressed that she didn't know why he said that or where he would get that from, which maintained her role as the teacher because although he was not serious, he did refer to a body, so Ms. Malone made a responsible teacher move to remove herself from the topic of the situation. In another situation, Ms. Malone used maintaining eye contact in order to maintain class control. I witnessed first-hand how a simple action such as facing the class, has the ability to keep them calm and on task. When a student walked in late, Ms. Malone addressed this misbehavior by sending him back to the office to get a note. Since this is school policy, the teacher showed the students that she follows the school rules and does not accept students walking in late. Having the whole class witness this will hopefully work as a preventative in the future with other students. In the instance of the student commenting on the difficulty level of a task, Ms. Malone did embarrass him, however, he was calling out which he knew he shouldn't be doing, and he also was saying a potentially hurtful comment. By calling him out it put the student in his place and exemplified for the rest of the class that you shouldn't make fun, or call out. Overall Ms. Malone exemplified how simple techniques, such as eye contact, matched with preventative measures, and following through with consequences, can be used together to manage classroom disruptions and interruptions.
Class topic: Cell structure and function
Grade level: 10th and 11th grade
Observed by: Kathryn Capone
Observation / Reflection #4:Be Quiet! I'm Trying To Talk!
In this observation, pay attention to how your teacher manages his or her classroom. What types of disruptions, if any, occur while you're visiting? How do they set the class in motion? How do they deal with interruptions (from the outside) and disruptions (from their students)? Determine whether there are students in the classes that you will teach that are especially troublesome. Ask your CT how he or she addresses these students' needs. Reflect on your "vision" of an ideal science classroom. What classroom policies will you try to implement in YOUR classroom? How does your vision align with your teaching philosophy?Observations:
During this observation, I was focusing in on the interruptions and disruptions my CT encountered throughout a normal class period and how she dealt with them. The first disruption I noticed in the classroom was a student saying sarcastically "this is SO easy" referring to an inquiry activity the class was participating in. The teacher quickly replied " if it's so easy, why don't you go up to the front of the class and teach it?". The class watched as this boy who called out now grew embarrassed. The next disruption occurred when Ms. Malone was instructing the students to bring in an egg the following day for extra credit. As she began her sentence "tomorrow I need you to bring in...", one of the male students in the front row shouted "a dead body!". Ms. Malone understood the student was obviously joking but she delivered a disproving look followed by saying "No...I need you to bring in an egg, I'm not sure why you want to bring in a dead body or how you would get one, but I don't want to know". Another disruption Ms. Malone encountered was a student walking in late past the bell. Ms. Malone had this student turn right back around and get a note from the office explaining why he was late. The student did as he was told and the class was only paused for a moment. The only interruptions Ms. Malone faced this day were various loud speaker announcements in the middle of class. There was a blood drive at school this day and so somebody would come on the loudspeaker every twenty minutes or so to call a new group down. Although it was quite irritating Ms. Malone would only pause for the students to hear the announcement, and then go right on teaching her lesson. While listening, the teacher held eye contact with the class so the students k ew to stay focused until it was over. These were the interruptions and disruptions that Ms. Malone experienced this day of observing in her classroom.Reflections:
I feel that the teacher in this case maintained control of the classroom by staying on top of the class behaviors, and reprimanding where necessary. I noticed that the disruptions that occurred within the classroom, Ms. Malone addreses and corrected, whereas interruptions from outside the classroom were ignored if possible. I liked this technique because the teacher addressed the issues she had control over but ignored the ones she had no control over. By doing this she successfully created a serious working environment inside the classroom where the students were on task and following directions. She kept the students on task with constant reminders, modeling good behavior, and teaching the students to not become distracted by outside noise and interruptions.
Ms. Malone was faced with a situation or two where proper management of the class was in jeopardy. In each situation she used a management technique that brought the class back under her control. For example, when a student called out to finish her sentence innappropriately, she gave him a look that communicated that she thought he was being silly and immature. She did not yell and her look did not make the boy feel stupid or embarrassed, it was just disproving and reiterating that she was trying to teach the class and he interrupted her with a silly comment. In her response she also addressed that she didn't know why he said that or where he would get that from, which maintained her role as the teacher because although he was not serious, he did refer to a body, so Ms. Malone made a responsible teacher move to remove herself from the topic of the situation. In another situation, Ms. Malone used maintaining eye contact in order to maintain class control. I witnessed first-hand how a simple action such as facing the class, has the ability to keep them calm and on task. When a student walked in late, Ms. Malone addressed this misbehavior by sending him back to the office to get a note. Since this is school policy, the teacher showed the students that she follows the school rules and does not accept students walking in late. Having the whole class witness this will hopefully work as a preventative in the future with other students. In the instance of the student commenting on the difficulty level of a task, Ms. Malone did embarrass him, however, he was calling out which he knew he shouldn't be doing, and he also was saying a potentially hurtful comment. By calling him out it put the student in his place and exemplified for the rest of the class that you shouldn't make fun, or call out. Overall Ms. Malone exemplified how simple techniques, such as eye contact, matched with preventative measures, and following through with consequences, can be used together to manage classroom disruptions and interruptions.
Class topic: Cell structure and function
Grade level: 10th and 11th grade
Observed by: Kathryn Capone